Experimental Determination Technique of Stress Intensity Factor and Its Application

The proportional extrapolation technique is proposed for determining experimentally and accurately stress intensity factors, using the crack tip stresses measured by strain gage. The technique is based on the assumption that the effects of gage length and width on the measurement of the crack tip stresses are corrected by comparing with standard problems, and the corrected results are only accurate in the limit as r→0 (r; distance from crack tip). A special strain gage pattern was developed for applying the proportional extrapolation technique. The stress intensity factors of a two-dimensional crack problem were analyzed using this strain gage, and as an application example, the fracture behavior under mixed mode loading was investigated on notched polymer sheets.